Hydrometer Cup Alternative

[Troutman10]

I'll be boiling this weekend and looking to buy a Hydrometer on Friday. The shop I'm going to purchase the Hydrometer from won't have Hydrometer cups until around March 1st. Can I use an alternative item as my Hydrometer cup if I can't find one in the mean time?

[wnybassman]

I'll be boiling this weekend and looking to buy a Hydrometer on Friday. The shop I'm going to purchase the Hydrometer from won't have Hydrometer cups until around March 1st. Can I use an alternative item as my Hydrometer cup if I can't find one in the mean time?

I've been using a brief case size thermos. Fill it once to warm it up, dump it, then fill it again.

[MapleME]

I've been using a brief case size thermos. Fill it once to warm it up, dump it, then fill it again.

I like this. Another alternative is finding a piece of stainless steel pipe and cap one end. Maybe a 2" pipe by, say 12" long would work. Basically you just need something tall and skinny that is somewhat food grade. You could use copper too, dunno how much that would cost but heck it could be the only one you need. 2" x12" long copper tube. Solder it to a 4"x4" base of some sort, and call it good. Would be a pretty sexy cup IMO , LOL

[ACollette]

Troutman,

I went to Lowes, picked up a 1" X 12" piece of pre cut copper in the plumbing section. Soldered a 1" copper cap on it. I use a 1" clamp style pipe hanger as a handle. It works great for me, because I only have a few taps and on many occasions I have limited syrup volume to scoop into the cup. The whole thing cost me less than $20.

[lfdiaff]

I did the 2" copper cup works great. Father owns a plumbing company so didn't pay much. He he. I took 1/2 rolled copper and made a nice looking handle and soldered it on works great.

[Homestead Farm]

Similar solution here- 1-1/4" brass/chrome under counter straight pipe with nut, iirc about $7. I cut a disk out of a pop can to seal the bottom and used the plastic o-ring as a gasket. Works great and no the o-ring hasn't melted. The handle is a fancy piece of scrap metal held with a band clamp. First class!

[bowtie]

i used a ss water bottle last year until i purchased a hydro cup, it worked great but had to use a hot mitt because it will get hot like 212 or hotter.

[eustis22]

wait a minute

how do you SEE the hydrometer encased in copper or any non-transparent material? How full do you fill the cup? enough so the hydrometer sticks out the top?

[MapleME]

yeah you need enough syrup to fill it almost to the top...filled high enough that when you SLOWLY let the hydrometer bob in the syrup that you can read the liquid level on the hydrometer but not too full or it will overflow once you add the mass of the hydrometer.

Another good practice is to fill your cup with hot syrup and let it warm up. I dip my cup in the syrup I want to test and let it sit for 10 seconds warming up the cup then dump it back in, and do it again. The third time I don't fill it all the way and test on that third dunk. You just want the hydrometer and syrup to be roughly the same temp